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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/24310591">Kerosene</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/assassinslover/pseuds/assassinslover'>assassinslover</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Motherland: Fort Salem (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>F/F, Mention of torture, mild language?</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-05-21</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-05-21</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-04 03:34:57</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,845</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/24310591</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/assassinslover/pseuds/assassinslover</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Originally posted over on my tumblr and never here, for some reason.</p><p>Post Ep. 5.</p><p>The Unit goes after Scylla.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Raelle Collar/Scylla Ramshorn</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>124</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Kerosene</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Whether or not to go after Scylla is never a question. She doesn’t care if she ends up getting court marshalled because of it either. The chaotic aftermath of the attack gives her the perfect cover to slip away, although apparently not unnoticed.</p><p>“Where the hell do you think you’re going?” she hears Abigail say behind her. Her and Tally are there, Abigail’s face still covered in blood and Tally’s still streaked with tears.</p><p>“If the Spree have her, I have to find her,” Raelle snaps back, shrugging off her dress jacket and carelessly discarding it. She pins Scylla’s corsage to her shirt and picks up a discarded Scourge. “And don’t bother trying to stop me, because I’ll go through you if I have to.”</p><p>“Like hell you are,” Abigail replies. She has one sleeve of her jacket off and is carefully pulling off the other. Her shirt beneath is dark with blood. “Not without us.”</p><p>Raelle distracts herself from her surprise by looking pointedly at the knife wound in Abigail’s shoulder and starting to ask, “Do you want me to-“</p><p>Abigail holds up a hand to silence her then rubs dried blood off her nose. “No. Now, what’s the plan?”</p><p>“Find her. Get her. Kill anyone who gets in the way.”</p><p>“That’s not a plan, that’s a suicide mission,” Abigail says.</p><p>“You got any better ideas, Bellweather?”</p><p>“Maybe we figure out where the hell she is first?”</p><p>Tally steps between them, sniffling. “Uh, maybe we should tell-“</p><p>“No,” Raelle and Abigail say. Abigail pinches the bridge of her nose, winces, then sighs. “We can’t just run off into the wild unknown and hope we get lucky. We need to track her, but that would need her hair, or her blood or-“</p><p>“This,” Raelle says. She holds up her hand and traces her fingertip over the remains of the spell cast there. “She said she always wanted to be able to say hi to me. Maybe we can use this to find her.”</p><p>Abigail stares down at the faint line. “It’s worth a go,” she says. Raelle sets the back of her hand in Abigail’s palm. It doesn’t hurt, just like how it hadn’t really hurt when Scylla cast the spell in the first place. It tingles, and burns a little, like holding her hand too close to a candle flame. Abigail mouths words under her breath, her breath faint on Raelle’s skin. And then it stops. Abigail staggers a little, leaning too hard into Tally. The shape on Raelle’s palm looks as fresh as when Scylla made it.</p><p>“Let’s go,” Abigail says. “Tally you should stay. You have en-“</p><p>“You two are not leaving me here alone,” Tally replies in a shaky but resolute voice. She rubs at her eyes with her knuckles and sets her shoulders, chin high as she, too, removes her jacket. It’s not ideal. There’s only three of them, inexperienced and largely unarmed, but everyone knows what happens to those who fall into the Spree’s hands, and Raelle refuses to let Scylla stay their hostage a moment longer.</p><p>-</p><p>The tracking spell isn’t the most accurate thing, and largely relies on Raelle’s sense of direction and intuition, but it’s hard to ignore what started as a faint itch on her palm steadily growing into a hot burn, like she put her hand on a lit stove or sat out in the sun too long. It takes them continuously deeper into a thick forest, until they’re tripping over raised roots and being pricked at by thorns and snagging on branches. Then, just when Raelle thinks she can’t take the pain in her hand it stops, completely, like a fire suddenly and violently quenched. She stops so short that both the other girls, who had been following close behind, run right into her back.</p><p>“What?” Abigail asks. “What is it? What happened?”</p><p>“It stopped working!” Raelle says. She shakes her hand like somehow that will kick the spell back into gear, then spins in a circle, hand up, trying to see if they took a wrong turn. When that fails, she whirls around to Abigail and all but shoves her hand in her face. “Cast it again,” she demands.</p><p>“Uh, guys,” Tally says in a meek voice.</p><p>“What?” They both turn their heads to look at her. Tally is looking at her feet. She’d brushed off a layer of dirt and leaves with her boots and beneath her, instead of more earth, is a sturdy metal door. Raelle rushes to Tally, nearly knocking her over as she falls on her knees and finishes clearing the door of forest debris. The handle is large and circular, like a ship’s door. Raelle hauls on it with all her strength, but it refuses to budge. She tries a second time, and then a third. Her grip slips on the fourth and she falls back, sprawling in the dirt. Abigail rolls her eyes.</p><p>“Use the Seed, idiot,” she says, and holds out her hands for Raelle and Tally to take. Raelle glares at her, but scrambles to her feet and grabs her hand. Tally hesitates, her arms wrapped around herself. Abigail gives her a pointed look and waves her free hand around.</p><p>“I think maybe we should tell someone we’re here,” Tally says. “We definitely can’t do this alone, there’s only three of us and we’re nowhere near ready for anything like this.”</p><p>“I’m not leaving here without Scylla,” Raelle says firmly. “You can either stay and help us or go back to the house, but I would really prefer it if you stayed.” Tally looks at her long and hard with an expression on her face that Raelle can’t read, then slowly reaches out and takes Abigail’s other hand.</p><p>-</p><p>The door crumples easily under their combined power with a horrible screech. The drop isn’t far, but it rattles Raelle’s teeth when she lands. Abigail drops down beside her with a curse, grabbing her shoulder. Tally stumbles but stays on her feet. The corridor ahead of them is lit with bright lights, ending with another solid door.</p><p>“Someone will have heard that,” Abigail says, stepping forward. “We need to move quickly. Can you feel where she is?”</p><p>Raelle clenches her hand tight. Shakes it. Nothing. “No. I can’t feel anything.”</p><p>“Guess we’re doing this the hard way, then.” Abigail says. She shoulders past Raelle, strides down the hallway, and slams her boot against the door until the lock gives and it swings open. A knife is in her hand, dried blood already on the blade. Raelle has a sinking suspicion it’s her own, but then there’s no more time for thinking.</p><p>There’s less resistance than Raelle would have thought, but its still enough. Her Scourge <em>sings</em> as it tears through flesh and bone. Blood splatters on her face. She can taste it on her tongue. She feels the tug and burn as she receives wounds of her own, but it doesn’t matter. Her, Abigail and Tally fight as a true unit, back to back, clearing the room and then branching into the offshoot hallways. Raelle’s blood races in her ears, and then she feels it, a pain so sharp she cries out and her vision goes dark, just for an instant. Her shout echoes and brings the other two running, sweating and panting, eyes bright with adrenaline. When they don’t notice any danger, they both drop to Raelle’s side.</p><p>Tally pushes her hair away from her face. “Are you okay? What is it?”</p><p>Raelle fights back the urge to vomit. “She’s here. She’s in here.” She raises her other arm, pointing a shaking hand to the door a few feet away, unassuming and almost blending into the wall around it.</p><p>“On your feet, soldier,” Abigail says, hauling Raelle up with a hand under her elbow. Raelle staggers into the wall but stays upright. She nudges Raelle behind her and Tally. The door doesn’t budge when she tries it, and no amount of kicking seems to help. Abigail and Tally link hands and shout. The door slams open, nearly falling off its hinges. The single person inside is thrown across the room by the force of the shout, knocking over a table and sending instruments Raelle doesn’t want to know the names to scattering across the floor with metallic clinks and clangs.</p><p>Raelle shoves past her unit hard enough to make Abigail hiss in pain and grab her shoulder. The room is dark. It takes a second for Raelle to see the body huddled in the corner, the black of her uniform blending in with the shadows.</p><p>“Scylla!” she shouts, sending tools skidding across the floor as she dashes over, all but falling to her knees. She reaches for Scylla’s face and her hands come away sticky and slick with blood. Her eyes adjust to the lower light and what she sees nearly makes her retch. She hardly recognizes Scylla for all the blood, for the burns and cuts on her skin. Her uniform is in tatters and where it’s not ripped it’s damp.</p><p>She throws a glance over her shoulder. “Help me!” she yells. “I need to her on the table! <em>Now!</em>” Abigail and Tally jolt into action. It takes the three of them to hoist Scylla’s dead weight onto the table. Raelle knows all the damage isn’t physical, but that she can do something about. She holds Scylla’s hand tightly in hers and mutters the words as quickly as she can under her breath, over and over. She won’t let Scylla die, even if it kills her.</p><p>It almost does.</p><p>-</p><p>When she wakes up she’s not in the Spree hideout. She’s… she’s not sure where she is. Not her room. Not the Bellweather house. She tries to sit up and pain lances through her body. Her vision darkens at the edges and dizziness threatens to make her sick.</p><p>“-ey, hey, you’re okay. Lie back down.” It passes. Raelle slowly turns her head. Tally is sitting next to her bed, holding Raelle’s hand in both of hers. She’s clean, and doesn’t look injured, but her eyes are red and there’s bags beneath them, and her mouth is pulled down at the corners.</p><p>“What happened? Where’s Scylla?” Raelle asks, although it comes out more as a jumble of words than anything coherent thanks to the giant cotton ball in her mouth. Tally offers her a cup of water. She drinks it greedily, then a second. Tally won’t look her in the eyes.</p><p>“Tally,” Raelle says slowly, “where is Scylla.”</p><p>“There’s something you need to know about her,” Tally says quietly. She looks down at their clasped hands then draws both of hers into her lap. She takes a very deep breath. “Scylla is Spree.”</p><p>Raelle chokes out a painful laugh. “If she’s Spree then why did we find her half dead?”</p><p>“Because-“</p><p>“She’s right, Raelle.” Raelle whips her head around so fast she nearly blacks out. Scylla lowers herself heavily into a chair next to Raelle’s bedside, looking pale and wan and trembling like a leaf. Tally glances between the two of them then silently takes her leave. There’s still half healed cuts and bruises on Scylla’s face, but judging from the pain in Raelle’s body she must have done something right.</p><p>“She’s right about what?” Raelle asks. She forces herself to sit upright. Scylla helps adjust her pillows then grips the arms of her chair with white knuckles. “About you being Spree? That’s not possible. If you’re Spree, then how come I had to save your ass from them?”</p><p>“Because I disobeyed them,” Scylla replies. Her eyes are so startlingly blue that Raelle can hardly stand to look at them. “About you.”</p><p>“Me? What do the Spree want with me?”</p><p>Scylla shrugs delicately. “I don’t know. They wouldn’t tell me. But I was supposed to take you to them at six the day of the wedding and…”</p><p>“And you didn’t,” Raelle finishes softly. “You didn’t. Why?”</p><p>“You know why,” Scylla says. She reaches for Raelle’s hand but Raelle flinches away. The kicked puppy look on Scylla’s face instantly floods her with guilt. She sighs and stretches her fingers out. Scylla takes them gratefully and clutches them tight. Raelle suppresses a wince. It feels like there isn’t an inch of her that doesn’t hurt somehow. When she sees the splint on two fingers of Scylla’s other hand, she remembers why.</p><p>She clenches her jaw. Fuck, even her teeth hurt. Her eyes hurt. Everything hurts. “I don’t understand,” she says, more to herself than Scylla. It sinks in slowly, like when she learned of her mother’s death.</p><p>The bed creaks gently as Scylla leans in. “Raelle, I am so sorry. I wanted to tell you, I just… I was trying to figure out a way to get out. I want to be a better person. <em>You</em> make me want to be a better person.”</p><p>“Better than what, a mass murderer? Do you know what the Spree have done?”</p><p>“Better than you do,” Scylla says, almost sharply but not quite. “And I thought their cause was just. I still think – It’s wrong, how they go about it. I see that now. You made me see that.”</p><p>“Well, I’m glad I’m a good influence on somebody,” Raelle grumbles under her breath.</p><p>Scylla chooses to ignore her. “You saved me, Raelle. I can never repay you for that. You don’t know what the Spree does to traitors.”</p><p>“Is that what you are now?” Raelle asks. She looks Scylla dead in the eye. “Don’t lie to me. I’ll know if you do.”</p><p>“Yes,” Scylla says without hesitation, her gaze not waving for a second.</p><p>Raelle closes her eyes and sighs. She focuses on the warmth of Scylla’s hand in hers. Her jaw relaxes first, and then her shoulders.</p><p>Her head lolls to the side then snaps back up as her body jerks. It’s dark in medical now, and at first Raelle thinks she’s alone, but then she notices the mop of dark hair near her hip. Her heart slows. The pain has lessened considerably, but her body is still battered from taking its own wounds on top of Scylla’s. Her fingertips tingle where they’ve started to fall asleep. She wriggles them gently, trying not to wake Scylla, but she inhales sharply and groans. She turns her head and blows her hair out of her eyes, looking groggy but awake.</p><p>“Hi.” Her voice is barely above a whisper.</p><p>“Hi,” Raelle says back.</p><p>“How are you feeling?”</p><p>“Like I got hit by a truck. Like, ten times.”</p><p>“You almost died,” Scylla says. Raelle gropes for the water next to her bed. “Healing me. Tally said – well she tried to say in-between Abigail reaming me – that you almost died Fixing me.”</p><p>“Yeah, it feels like it,” Raelle says with a short laugh. She drains her water in a few gulps. “But I’m a fast healer.”</p><p>Scylla chuckles softly at that, the hint of a smile on her lips. She sobers quickly. “Are you mad at me?”</p><p>“Yes,” Raelle answers. “No. I don’t know. I just know that the thought of the Spree having you, how it felt seeing you like that… I couldn’t stand it. I still can’t.”</p><p>“I meant what I said, you know,” Scylla says. She presses her thumb against the back of Raelle’s hand. “I wasn’t lying then. And I’m not lying now.” She glances towards the door, looking scared. “No matter what happens, I love you.”</p><p>Raelle follows her gaze, but there’s no one outside the door and no one else in the ward with them. “They won’t tell anyone,” she says. “Not even Abigail. We’re all in enough trouble as it is but at least we can justify it if we say we went after a fellow soldier.”</p><p>“I don’t know how you can justify disobeying direct orders,” Scylla replies. Raelle just shrugs.</p><p>“It doesn’t matter. I planned on dying my first time out anyway. At least this way I’ll have done something worth it.”</p><p>“Don’t say that,” Scylla says. “I can’t think about you dying.” Raelle apologizes with a sheepish face. Silence grows, only slightly uncomfortable. Raelle hates even the little bit of tension.</p><p>It’s up to Scylla to break it again. “I still want to take you to the beach. To the lighthouse. If you’ll let me.” Raelle meets her gaze and Scylla smiles, and raises Raelle’s hand to her mouth to kiss her knuckles and press them against her forehead. “I’m so sorry.”</p><p>“Yeah, well, you’ll have a lot more apologizing to do once they let me out of this bed,” Raelle replies. “And explaining.”</p><p>“I’ll tell you everything,” Scylla says, and it’s the second most honest Raelle’s ever heard her sound.</p><p>“I’ll hold you to that,” she says, and she lets herself relax back into the pillows as Scylla slips into the bed next to her without a word and buries her face in Raelle’s neck. Her breath tickles, but it’s the best feeling in the world. Raelle snuggles just that much closer. “I love you, too.”</p>
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